Spy Aftermath
by BananaBirdNova
Summary: Nova. Written in response to Bananabird's (brilliant) Spy; this is what happens when Star gets involved. Written with Bananabird's whole-hearted approval.
1. The Truth You Can't Handle

A/N: K, guys, rest assured I'm aware that this is going to disappoint some of you. But Bananabird approves, and frankly, that's all I care about. : )

So when Bananabird told me about Spy, I though it was brilliant, as did many of you, and at the end I asked her if Mirage was dead, which I know a few of you did as well, and she said, oh. I don't know. I guess? And I said, well, let's check. So I sent Star out to find him and she did, and this is what happened.

I sort of wanted to finish Equal and Opposite before I posted anything else with Star in it, but upon further reflection and with encouragement from Bananabird I have decided to make an exception for Aftermath. If you get lost, consult Equal and Opposite (the first chapter, at least). And this certainly won't make any sense if you haven't read Spy.

(Also, I had really awesome title cards in here for the chapters, but they were created in power point and inserted as pictures into word, so you don't get the benefit of the awesome font and red/black color scheme. bummer.)

Off we go!

* * *

**The Truth You Can't Handle**

By the time Star arrived on the scene, the shuttle was drifting aimlessly, completely dead. The attack had been swift, to the point, and unexpectedly powerful. They had planned on the transport being attacked, but not the way it had, with heavy artillery and stealth unbecoming of the Decepticons. She was the first of the rescue party to get there, but the 'Cons were already gone. So she floated through one of the gaping holes in the side of the ship and landed on the blasted, pockmarked metal of what had been the bridge, beginning the search for survivors.

She found the scanty few there were in what was left of the shuttle's small med-bay. There were five of them, two in critical condition, and their medic was working hard to keep them both online. He was immensely grateful for the femme's skilled assistance, and by the time the rest of the rescue team arrived they had managed to relatively stabilize both of them. While the rescue team hurried to evacuate the five mechs and get them to Iacon, Star slipped away to walk down empty halls in the shuttle, noting the signs of battle, checking the greyed chassis she came across, until she found herself in what was left of the brig.

There was a gaping hole in the side of the shuttle, tearing across three cells but centered on the one that until recently had been occupied. Star inspected the rend, and then turned to the far side of the brig, to the mess of twisted, scorched metal that used to be the side of the hull and part of the roof. Trapped beneath the wreckage was a single chassis, and the femme came to a stop where she could see it to grimly inspect the damage.

Mirage looked like he had been caught directly in the explosion, the side of his chassis that had been facing it charred black and laced with shrapnel. Star pursed her lips and scanned the mech, and was surprised to receive a faint pulse of life from him. He was in stasis and heavily damaged, but he was alive. So with a frown the femme began to move the debris.

Star was confused. She had thought she had known the mech, and never would have pegged him as a double agent. In fact, she still harbored significant doubt that he was. She had searched the mech after all, when Cliffjumper had accused him of being a traitor the first time around. And there had been no indication of treachery then. How could there be now?

When she had finally moved enough to get the former noble out from beneath the wreckage she laid him down to diagnose the full extent of the damage. He looked horrible, but was surprisingly stable. That wouldn't last long without medical attention, though. The femme stared, trying to decide what to do. From what Optimus had told her, there wasn't much doubt in anybody else that Mirage was the double agent, which meant the council wouldn't be open to any argument of hers. Still, something was not right. She could feel it. She needed to know for herself. She needed to talk to Mirage and find out the truth, and if she took him to Iacon then even if she did find out he was innocent there would be nothing she could really do for the mech before he was sentenced to the stockade or worse.

So as footsteps echoed down what was left of the hall to the brig Star grabbed the mech, found the manual switch for his invisibility mod and turned it on, and then shoved him out the gaping hole in the side of the ship. "I'll come back for you." She promised in a whisper as the chassis went floating off into space.

"Find anything Star?"

The femme turned from contemplating the breach to shake her head with a frown. "Nothing. They must have taken him."

The mech looked puzzled. "Well, that's a little odd. Why would they do that? Don't they normally just kill failures?"

"Well, yes." Star replied. "But he was a very prominent double-agent. They may have felt the need to inflict some Decepticon justice on him." She shrugged. "I don't know. I'm pretty sure he's been taken care of, anyway."

"Well then, good riddance." The mech nodded. "We're ready to head out, someone'll be back to tow this pile of scrap to the shipyard for salvage pretty soon and we got all the bodies and survivors off. You comin?"

Star nodded distractedly. "I'll catch up. I'm going to look around some more, see if I can dig anything up."

"Suit yourself." The mech shrugged and turned to leave as Star gently lifted off the shuttle and inspected the hull from the outside of the ship. She waited for the rescue shuttle to leave, and for the tow shuttle to haul the destroyed transport away, and then when there was no one there to watch she turned away from Cybertron and followed the faint pulses of signal to reclaim the invisible spy.

* * *

Mirage was disoriented when he woke up. Mostly because the roof was really far away and not orange.

And then he was sitting up a little too quickly, checking himself for damage and looking around to figure out where he was, because last he remembered there was a lot of exploding going on and he was set to be put on trial for crimes he had not committed. He was surprised to find half of himself still charred black, though most of the rest of the damage had been taken care of.

"So, Mirage,"

The noble whipped his head in the direction of the voice and was surprised to see Star sitting on another berth, though he was fairly certain she hadn't been there a moment ago.

"I think you've got a story to tell me." She finished.

"Star, you have to believe me, I'm innocent!" Mirage hurriedly claimed.

Star shrugged. "That's not what Optimus thinks, or what the evidence suggests."

"I know." The mech slumped a little, disappointed at the frosty reception. "But I didn't do it. I'm not a traitor! And I don't know how to convince you, but I really am innocent."

The femme gave him a grim look. "If you didn't do it, Mirage, who did?"

The mech stared at her helplessly, and then sighed. "I think I know who did it, it's the only bot who I think could have possibly done it, but I doubt you would believe me if I told you."

"Try me." She shrugged.

Mirage met the femme's unwavering gaze, took a deep vent, and said, "I think it was Jazz."

Slowly, Star tilted her head down, both optic ridges raising in incredulity. "That is a very bold accusation, Mirage."

"I know." The mech replied quietly, looking down. "But think about it. I didn't do it, so someone planted all the evidence on me and repeatedly maneuvered me into very suspicious circumstances. Unless someone else has higher officer access and is far cleverer than I've ever given them credit for, Jazz is the only one who could have."

There was a moment of silence in the small med-bay, Mirage keeping his head down and Star just staring at him until the femme got up and walked out, leaving the mech alone.

She strode out of the med-bay into a huge room filled with datapads, and a larger, much older-looking mech was waiting there for her. He glanced up expectantly from his large datapad, archaic quill stylus poised above it. The femme sat down across the table from him and folded her hands, optics fixed on the smooth metal. Alpha Trion waited.

"I sense no lie in him." Star finally admitted. "As far as I can tell, he's innocent. But he's also trying to tell me that Jazz is the traitor." She looked up at the wise mech. "Alpha… as much as I want to believe that Mirage _isn't_ the traitor…"

Alpha Trion nodded in understanding. "This could very well tear Optimus Prime's team apart."

Star sighed, gaze dropping. Alpha began to write again, quill scratching across the screen of the pad with a familiar sound. "The Prime has been trying to contact you." The Archivist mentioned after a few minutes.

"I know. I guess… I'll go talk to him now."

Star got up with another sigh and wandered over to the large computer console. For a moment, she simply stood before it, thinking, and then she reached out and began typing. Within a minute Optimus had appeared on the screen.

"Star, I trust you have heard about what happened to the transport carrying Mirage by now." He kicked off the conversation quickly.

"I have. I was the first to arrive at the shuttle. I looked. He wasn't there."

The Prime leaned back slightly. "Are you positive?"

"Trust me, Optimus, I was very thorough in my search. Nothing."

"Well that can't be right," another voice chimed in, and Teletraan zoomed out so she could see the much shorter form of Jazz next to the Prime, frowning in confusion.

Star held up her hands. "That's what I thought, but I looked, Jazz. All over. He was just gone."

The saboteur cocked his helm in thought. "You think he coulda escaped durin' th'battle?"

"It's that or the 'Cons grabbed him so they could punish him themselves for his failure." She shrugged. "But space doesn't leave much of a trail to follow, and by the time I got there the 'Cons were already gone. I'll keep looking, don't worry."

"Please do." Optimus agreed. "And please keep us posted."

"I will. Star out."

She ended the transmission, and then stood there again for a while. He had acted completely normal.

But then, so had she.

Star let her head drop. There was nothing there except for Mirage's suggestion, but something was wrong. _Something_ was different, though she couldn't say what it was. It was just a little nudge of unsettled suspicion, but it was enough.

With an abrupt snarl, she turned back to the med-bay and strode back in to sit on the berth again, frowning at the charred mech. He hadn't moved except to start rubbing at the blackened parts of his armor, and looked up at the femme hopefully. Star eyed him narrowly, calculating. He met her gaze, and didn't look away.

"I won't say I believe you." She finally told him. "But I will hear you out. Tell me everything that happened."

So Mirage told her, from the very beginning, and left nothing out.

When he was done she looked more troubled than suspicious of him. He took it as a good sign, but then she sat there and thought about it for quite a long time, and the noble-mech started to get restless. He looked around again, trying to determine where he was. It wasn't really a med-bay, it had too much other equipment to be a real med-bay, and he hadn't seen anybody else in here other than Star, so finally he turned to the femme and dared to ask.

"Star, where are we?"

Star sat up, pulled from her musings, and then stood. "Alpha Trion's med-bay."

"Laboratory, actually." The wizened mech corrected as he stepped in, moving to the counter and starting to look for something.

"Only evil scientists call it a 'laboratory', Alpha. Besides, it's a med-bay right now."

Mirage's optics were wide as he stared at the old mech. He had been unaware that the Archivist was still alive, and to be suddenly in his presence was strange indeed.

"So he's going to be watching you while I go try to figure this thing out. You stay put and don't give him any trouble, or else I'll have to give you some trouble when I get back. Got it?"

Mirage snapped his gaze back to her. "Yes." He said. She nodded.

"Good."

And the femme strode away.

* * *

She didn't want to believe him. It was ludicrous, after all. But maybe that was what made her need to be sure; the fact that Jazz would be one of the last mechs anyone would suspect. So she flew herself all the way to Earth, snuck onto the Ark, and for three weeks she sifted through Teletraan's data, meticulously searching the well-organized case files (courtesy of Prowl) and watching, always watching. Nobody ever saw her, she was never detected, and she never gave anyone any indication that she was there—not even Prime.

And as she searched, pieces began to fall into place and they all worked out to give her the same picture that Mirage had.

She didn't want to believe him. But the truth of the matter was… he was right.

She returned to Cybertron and Alpha Trion's underground archive, trudging in unannounced to sit across the table from both Alpha and Mirage as the Archivist worked away at his pad and Mirage read another. Both mechs looked up at her, one expectant, one fearfully hopeful.

"You're right." She said, and her voice was nothing more than a whisper. There was a weight in her optics when she looked up at a relieved Mirage. "It is Jazz."

The once more blue and white mech set his pad down with a deep vent, some sort of tension seeping out of him, and he tried not to smile too much. Star was convinced that he was innocent and that was great. For him. But Jazz was still on the Ark, and the whole team was oblivious to the wolf among them. They would have to devise a plan to change that.

And then to deal with the fallout of having one of their top officers and most trusted and liked Autobots turn out to be a Decepticon spy this entire time.

"So what are we going to do?" he asked.

Star closed her optics, rubbing at her face and blowing out a vent. She was still for a moment, and then something in her hardened and her optics were sharp crystals of ice when she opened them.

"We make him confess."


	2. How to Skin a Cat

A/N: You get two chapters now, because I skipped an intended update due to midterm-related time issues. : )

* * *

**How to Skin a Cat**

"I found what was left of Mirage."

That was how she announced herself to the meeting, and everything ground to a halt to look up at the door. Star had already stopped next to the table, the door closing behind her quietly, and she dropped a piece of hardware on the table with a grim expression. The officers stared at it until Jazz leaned forward to poke the piece of slag.

"That's it?" he asked. "What is it, anyway?"

"Used to be a cloaking field generator. There were other pieces, enough to identify as most of Mirage, but that was the least damaged piece."

Jazz poked at the thing a bit more. "Y'sure it was him?"

"Absolutely."

Jazz sat back with a thoughtful hum, contemplated for a bit, and then nodded. "Guess that settles it then."

"I suppose it does." Star murmured.

There was a moment of silence before the femme sighed and moved to take the empty seat they usually left out for her.

"Anyway, sorry for the interruption. Carry on. I'll catch up."

And the meeting moved on, leaving the piece of twisted, destroyed hardware where it was on the table.

~0~0~0~

After the meeting Jazz was the first one out the door, as usual. But Star was right behind him.

"Hey, Jazz, could I talk to you for a moment?"

The saboteur gave her a curious helm tilt, slowing down dramatically as he waited for her to catch up. "Sure, Star, what'cha need?"

The taller femme fell into step with the Porsche, hands behind her back and a somber expression on her face. "I'm sorry about Mirage. That he turned out to be a double agent, that is. I kind of feel it's my responsibility to be able to detect these sorts of things, and the fact that I didn't for so long bothers me."

Jazz gave her a subdued grin. "Ain't your fault, Star. Pit, the mech was workin' fer me fer how long now, and I never really suspected 'im either. Sometimes these things jus' slip through the cracks, and it ain't nobody's fault. 'Sides, least now we know the truth."

Star smiled. "Yes, at least now that I know the truth I can be a little more careful."

Jazz didn't so much as twitch at the peculiar phrasing, not that she had expected him to. He'd stayed undercover for this long, it wasn't likely anything she was going to say was going to make him react.

"But hey," she leaned over slightly to elbow him in the shoulder. "You ever want to talk to somebody about it, just comm me, alright?"

"Sure thing." Jazz agreed easily.

"I'll see you around then." She said, slowing to a stop.

"See ya!" Jazz replied, and sped up again to hurry to the rec room. Star watched him go, standing in the hall with her arms crossed over her chest, letting him catch a glimpse of her careful stare as he turned the corner before she abruptly disappeared into thin air.

~0~0~0~

She watched him with that same calm, almost neutral expression for the next week, but only when nobody else would see her. When they interacted, when someone else was watching, she acted completely normal. But she let Jazz know that something was off, and she knew he could feel her stare always on him, making him twitch and search for the source of the discomfort. She always turned and walked away when he caught her optic, and when he tried to ask her what was up she just smiled a bit and said it was nothing before being called away or simply leaving him to stand there and frown after her.

When the time came for his monthly report, he headed up to the top of the mountain to transmit, claiming mild insomnia when he stopped to chat with Bumblebee on the way out. He sent off his transmission without a hitch and stood alone for a moment waiting for a reply from Soundwave.

"Lovely night for a stroll, isn't it?"

Only years of training kept Jazz from cursing out loud and spazzing. He jumped and whirled quickly, though, to find Star standing not far behind him, pale blue optics bright in the dark of the shadow she lurked in. There was none of the usual warmth in her optics, just that quiet observance she'd been treating him with ever since she'd come back from Cybertron.

He grinned easily, forcing himself to relax. "Scared me, femme. Y'should know better than to sneak up on a special ops."

She smiled back, but the expression didn't reach her optics as she stepped out of the shadow to join him on the ledge. "Sorry. I forget to be loud, sometimes."

Jazz chuckled. "You an' me both. I ever tell you 'bout that time Prowler nearly took my helm off 'cause I accidentally snuck up on him during night monitor duty while he was the only one in the room?"

"I don't think you have." She laughed a bit. "But I believe it. Can't find a single thing in his records, but I swear that mech must have had some sort of special ops training."

The shorter mech shrugged. "Dunno, that old Diffusion self-defense training is pretty intense. Not quite spec ops grade, but close enough to make him almost as dangerous to sneak up on."

Star nodded, looking up to the almost full moon thoughtfully. Jazz kept himself completely relaxed and calm as Soundwave's return transmission finally came through. Star didn't even twitch, and after a moment of silence Jazz turned to her. "So you sure nothin's up? Y'still givin' me weird looks every time I turn around."

Star sighed, her wings drooping. "I know. I'm sorry, Jazz. I'm just…still recovering from what happened with Mirage." She admitted quietly. A smile twitched across her face. "If it's any consolation, I'm sure I'm creeping out Bumblebee just as much."

Jazz laughed, even though he knew it was a lie. He'd been watching to see if she was doing the same to anyone else, and he knew she wasn't. The honesty he was reading in her face and body language was confusing though. "So if he starts hidin' from ya, I'll know why?"

She grinned. "Yeah, you will. Well, good night Jazz. I hope you can sleep better now."

She stepped around him to continue down the path, opposite the way he had come up, and the saboteur stared after her with a slight frown. He considered reiterating his suspicions to Soundwave, but knew he would get the same answer from the communications officer, and so after a moment shrugged and started back to the Ark.

"He's starting to get spooked." Star said casually as she meandered down the path on the other side of the mountain.

"Do you think he'll try to run?" a disembodied voice answered quietly.

The femme contemplated as Mirage materialized beside her, falling into step. "No. Not yet. But soon."

"Did you get the transmission?"

"Sure did." She grinned sharply at the blue and white spy. "That should complete the evidence file, don't you think?"

"Considering the amount of data we've gathered, I should think it's hardly necessary, but it does give us something to lead off the accusation with." Mirage sighed. "Do you want me to present it?"

"No." the femme shook her helm, a smirk touching her face. "I have a plan for the meeting tomorrow. Here's what we're gonna do."

* * *

"Prime!" Star barked as she stepped through the door, face twisted into a serious frown, optics hard. Something serious was going down, and the meeting ground to a halt immediately at her exclamation, waiting in battle-ready anticipation as she began to travel around the seated officers, brandishing a datapad. Jazz perked up from his slump across the table, something in his spark clenching, but was almost reassured when she swept past without sparing a single glance for him.

"We have a situation." She growled, slapping the pad down in front of Optimus and then stepping back. The Prime was quick to begin reviewing, processor whirring battle programs to life while Star summed it up for the rest of the officers. "I've been looking into the Mirage thing more in-depth while I've been here and it's not adding up."

Prowl's doorwings twitched. "How do you mean, Star?" he asked, itching to know what was making Optimus frown so deeply and look so confused as he read.

"I mean, Mirage wasn't the spy." The femme snapped back. She met Prowl's gaze angrily as Jazz tensed right next to her.

"What? Then who was?" the saboteur demanded, turning to face her with outrage and confusion in his expression, too.

She looked down on him, wings held rigid and high, and glared. "Who indeed, Jazz."

There was an instant of silence. "Wait." Jazz said, and then chuckled a bit. "You ain't accusin' me of somethin', are ya Star?"

"Why don't we ask the data?" she snapped, syncing to the projector and displaying the file she had given Optimus for the whole room to see. "I'm not dumb enough to walk in here and make an accusation like this without being entirely sure and having the facts with me, Jazz, you know that."

Jazz frowned and turned to study the information scrolling past on the screen. "What facts? There can't be any facts when it ain't the truth."

"But it is the truth, Jazz." Star said, suddenly quiet. "And I procured every shred of evidence necessary to prove it. Including your transmission to Soundwave last night."

"Star, Ah don't know what's gotten inta you, but this is plum crazy!" Ironhide complained, turning to Optimus. "Prahm, Ah don't care what evidence she says she's got, there ain't no way Jazz is a 'Con."

Optimus looked intensely perplexed. "Though I am inclined to agree with you, Ironhide, the report is quite thorough. Jazz." The mech finally looked up, giving his third a contrite look, and Jazz returned an incredulous one of his own. "In keeping with proper procedure when a charge of this magnitude is presented, I'm going to have to place you in the brig until we sort this all out. I do apologize."

Jazz looked back at the screen and the evidence scrolling past, processor working hard to determine his next course of action. There was enough data in that file to condemn him, he knew there was. If he went to the brig, if he didn't get out now, he was pretty sure he wouldn't get out at all. This was his best chance. Besides, the opportunity for drama was too great to pass up.

"Naw, I get it. I's alright, Prime, 'cause you know what?" He stood up and felt Star tensing behind him, ready for action. "Actually, she's right."

The room froze for a critical moment as they processed the unexpected statement, and that was when Jazz moved, whirling to kick his chair into Star before she could grab him and diving onto the table to sprint for the door. Two fistfuls of mini-grenades appeared in his hands and he tossed them to either side as he went, jumping over a blankly shocked Wheeljack and dodging out the door as the grenades went off. Smoke poured out of the room and the automatic fire extinguishers turned on, the wail of internal emergency sirens following him down the hall.

"JAZZ!" He heard the femme roar behind him as he transformed and sped away, knowing he wasn't going to outrun her to the entrance, but also knowing that he didn't have to.

He drifted around the corner and into the rec room, where everybody was waiting for someone to come on the intercom and tell them what was wrong. Transforming, he grinned evilly at the room when every last mech turned to him for an answer.

"Hey guys!" he greeted. "Who wants to be m'hostage?" he looked over to the closest bot and found Bluestreak staring at him with innocent confusion on his face. "Blue! Yer perfect, c'mere."

"What?" the gunner had time to say, alarm flashing across his face, and then Jazz was behind him, yanking the taller Praxian down to pinch a doorwing between his elbow and side painfully while touching the edge of a blade to Blue's throat. The other hand had a gun leveled at the young mech's back between the wing joints, all in about the time it took to blink.

Star was the first officer on the scene, followed closely by a scorched Prime and a mostly undamaged Prowl. The rest of the room was frozen as they had been when Jazz had entered, jaws on the floor. The Decepticon grinned.

Star flung her arms out, halting the other two officers before they could finish processing the situation, and then their jaws were on the floor, too. Even Prowl looked extremely shocked. The alarm's wail was the only sound for a good few seconds, and then Jazz tilted his helm thoughtfully. "Gonna be kinda hard t'negotiate with that noise." He said, just loud enough to be heard over the siren.

Star nodded stiffly, glaring, and the alarm shut off, though the red emergency lights still flickered, flashing across Jazz's smirk.

"Y'know, this whole thing was s'possed t'be cleared up after I got rid o'Mirage." He started amiably.

"Whoa, whoa, hold on. What?" Sideswipe suddenly cut in, waving his hands in a slowdown gesture. "Is this a joke? You're all joking, right?"

"It's a very bad joke if it is." Optimus finally found his voice again. "Jazz, stop this."

"Aw, but I'm havin' so much fun." Jazz grinned. Optimus opened his mouth, but Jazz cut him off. "Save yer breath, Prime, it ain't a joke. Star's right. I am the double agent."

He couldn't help but take a picture of that moment, when even though it seemed impossible, everybody descended into even worse shock.

"What? Jazz?" Bluestreak wondered quietly, voice trembling a bit. "It was… you? But…"

"Yup!" Jazz announced gleefully. "Sorry, Baby Blue. Mirage was just a really convenient scapegoat. And the funny thing was, you guys made it easy for me. Y'all _wanted_ Mirage to be the traitor. I jus' had to make it look convincing."

Something changed in Optimus' face, a horrified light coming to his optics, and Jazz's grin pulled sharper. "Now, 'bout how this li'l scene's gonna end here. Guess I'm gonna talk t'you mostly, Star, since you're the only one who really know's what's goin' on."

The femme glared dangerously, but nodded again.

"So, y'all want Blue back an' I'll give 'im to ya. All y'gotta do is sit tight right here an' I'll send him on home when I'm clear."

"Whoa, wait." Sideswipe cut in again. "This is actually happening? Like for real?"

"Sure is Sides, welcome to th'party." Jazz flashed a crooked grin at the two front-liners on the couch, the television show they'd been watching completely forgotten.

Prowl stepped forward, hands lifted calmingly. "Jazz, whatever this is you can't possibly expect to escape…"

"Y'wanna bet Blue's life on that, Prowler?" The Decepticon interrupted before he could go on, voice soft and serious. "'Cause I could put two shots through his laser core right now in under a second without even tryin'. Just. Like. That." Bluestreak whimpered as the rifle at his back pitched higher and tapped against the sensitive joints with each word. Jazz's smirk turned disturbingly predatory. "I could prob'ly getcha all right now. Like shootin' fish in a barrel, I think the humans say."

"Not quite." A voice echoed through the room. Most mecha's optics widened at the familiar, cultured tone. Jazz cocked his helm, trying to pinpoint the source.

"I don't believe the fish usually shoot back."

Star was smiling coldly at the saboteur as Optimus and Prowl glanced over at her.

"Star, is that—" Optimus started.

"Mirage." Jazz greeted calmly, possibly the only other bot in the room not surprised. "I was startin' t'wonder if you were actually dead."

"Unfortunately for you, no. Not quite." Mirage's voice returned, still impossible to pin down.

Jazz turned a vindictive grin on the femme. "Turns out Star's just as good at lyin' as I am. Kinda makes you wonder, don't it?" Her glare returned full force. "Why don'cha come on out, Raj?"

"Why don't I, Jazz?" Came the soft whisper in his audio. The Decepticon had a fraction of a second to realize where the other spy was before Mirage melted out of the wall behind him and tried to wrest his gun and knife away.

It was enough time to get one shot off before they stumbled away, leaving Bluestreak collapsed on the floor behind them.

Star was the first to move, jumping to the young Praxian's side and starting to stem the flow of energon while Mirage and Jazz continued to struggle. Before anybody else could snap out of it Jazz had thrown the taller mech off and started for the door, sending a few shots into the gaping ranks of Autobots frozen in place. Mirage was the only mech who had the presence of mind to shoot back and pursue.

"Prime, get your aft in gear!" Star snapped. "Prowl, go get Ratchet!"

Optimus jumped and the next moment was barking out orders, and the entire room came alive.

Prowl continued to stare, optics starting to flicker, and promptly collapsed into stasis.

"Ratchet!" Star hollered into her comm instead. "Get to the rec room, Jazz shot Bluestreak!"

/He WHAT?!/

Star clamped the last severed line closed and got up, sprinting for the door and transforming as soon as she could.

Jazz was already out of the Ark, most of the rec room and the guards that had been at the door now hot on his bumper as he roared toward the canyons. Once he made it in there, nobody would be able to find him. The drizzle they'd had since that morning made the ground muddy and masked his dropped land mines. Three of them went off behind him, but Mirage was not shaken and nosed up beside him, easily keeping up with the sports car.

The sound of a jet engine became audible behind him and Jazz cursed to himself, calculating the risk in stopping to make sure the femme couldn't follow him rather than continuing his run for the canyons. As Mirage moved to bump him he decided he'd have better luck getting rid of the both of them and swerved away, locking his front tires to put him in a spin and transforming, leveling one of his illegal rifles at the skidding Ligier.

Three rapid shots later Mirage wasn't getting up anytime soon, or ever again if he didn't get immediate medical attention, and Jazz was transforming to finish his escape as laser fire rained down from the seeker above.

But then it wasn't as Star stopped and transformed to save Mirage, and Jazz was in the canyons and home free before anybody else could catch up, disappearing into the catacombs of the volcanic formation.

Or, he would be as soon as he went back and brought Megatron some heads as trophies.

* * *

A/N: I'm sure some of you can imagine just how much fun it is to write evil Jazz. ; D


	3. Aftermath

**Aftermath**

Prowl worked away at the datapad in his hand, one of a substantial pile on his desk. If anybody had happened to poke their helm into his office, the mech would have appeared to be completely engrossed in his paperwork and may not even have noticed them. And Prowl's mind _was_ quite occupied, but the work was only his strategy for distracting himself from what his thoughts kept going back to without his permission. His doorwings drooped a bit as doubt flashed through him and he paused his diligent scribbling to offline his optics for a moment, pushing the feeling, as well as the guilt and pain that came hard on its heels, back down.

"Well don't you just look DE-pressed."

Prowl's helm and doorwings snapped up at the casual drawl, his processors pulling back to the present reality. Complete surprise and shock flashed across his face to see the white and black Porsche leaning against the far wall as if he belonged there, as if he'd always been there, waiting for him to notice.

"Jazz?" he exclaimed, rising half out of his seat, battle computer already starting to hum away in minor panic with the implications. "How did you…"

The mech chuckled, grinning as if it were another harmless prank, a joke, when they both knew it was anything but. "C'mon Prowler, didja honestly think I wouldn' be back t'finish th'job? I almost know Red's loopholes better'n he does."

Prowl slowly finished standing, CPU catching up to his battle processor and beginning to weigh his options. He surreptitiously placed his palms on the table, inching for the panic button hidden in the panels he had really only let Red install to get the mech to leave him alone.

Jazz's grin became a smirk. "Aw, mech, I thought y'knew me better'n that. Y'know I already disabled every anal security feature in an' around the room. I's just you an' me Prowler."

It had been a long shot, anyway.

Something in Jazz's visor changed then, though Prowl wasn't sure what it was that suddenly dredged up his fight or flight instincts, and it honestly freaked the tactician out as the saboteur took what anybody else would probably mistake as a completely non-threatening step closer. He automatically took a step back, hand lifting to pull his rifle from subspace. Jazz remained visibly unarmed, but they both knew what he was capable of, as his sharpened smirk displayed all too clearly. As he took another completely innocent step forward, Prowl put a cap on his fluctuating emotions and took a half-step back, angling himself and lifting his rifle to be ready for a quick shot, replacing his shock and prey instinct with firm determination.

"Jazz, stop this. We can work something out if you would simply—"

He was interrupted by the other mech's laughter, honest laughter that was so _real_ and familiar and Jazz-like that it just plain…hurt. The assassin placed his hands on his hips, grinning broadly as his amusement faded back to manageable levels.

"C'mon, Prowl, I'm your best friend, and I know you better than that. Nothin's gonna get 'worked out' here. I've been a loyal Decepticon right under your olfactory sensors this whole time, an' nothin' you say will sway me. 'Sides, you're my ticket for gettin' back inta Megsy's good graces, or, your head is anyway." Jazz eyed the black and white critically as the mech's doorwings wilted and something on his face fell just slightly at the statement, though his gaze and attention never wavered.

"No, you never were my friend, were you." The Autobot murmured softly, his voice giving nothing away.

"Well…" the assassin considered, gaze apparently turning up to the ceiling for a moment in bold mockery. "No. Kinda sad, ain't it, Prowler, that your best friend and just about only friend is a Decepticon. Hurts, don't it?"

He wasn't jeering or mocking now, no, this was worse than that. His voice was quiet, it had that tone the mech always used when he was telling the tactician things he needed to hear but didn't really want to, things only a real friend would say. It was then that Prowl let go of any hope of this situation resolving itself any other way, and he let go of Jazz. He had to. His survival depended on it.

"Yes." He admitted in hardly a whisper as he let his battle computer shut down his emotional core and take control. It was the instant Jazz had been waiting for; the barest flicker in functioning only he was quick enough to catch, and he pounced…

Only to have something plow into him from the side with all the force of a speeding freight train and slam him against the wall. It was over so fast it was embarrassing; he hit the wall hard enough to put a dent in it, light exploding across his refreshing vision, and even though he instinctively had his favorite silicon knife out to stab his attacker—which he did with a fair amount of his own force—the next thing he felt were sharp digits ramming up into his undercarriage, wrapping around as many wires and components as they could, and ripping them all out as electricity snapped through his chassis.

It was the Femme, the Nova, snarling half-spoken expressions of rage and hate into his face when he could focus again, and the room was flooding with other mechs—Prime and Ironhide among them—all loudly securing the area, but all Jazz knew was the Femme as she untangled her hand, yanking the pulled components and wires painfully to grab his chestplate and slam him against the wall again, _hard_.

Out of everybody; Prime, Prowl, Red Alert, Ironhide, even Sunstreaker as the front-liner leveled his rifle at the Decepticon from the side, Jazz had been most worried about Star, because while Prime had his pathetic moral code that he would hold himself and his Autobots to, he knew with just as much surety that Star would not be held to that same code, that she would in fact bend to the level he was familiar with among his true comrades. That conviction was reinforced tenfold as his numb hand slipped off the handle of his knife and his legs only twitched and jerked uselessly at his commands to move and the Nova hissed in a language she knew he understood _exactly_ what she was going to do to him for his crimes.

"Prowl, are you okay?" the Prime was meanwhile asking.

"Yes, Prime, I am perfectly functional." The tactician replied quietly, battle computer beginning to relinquish control as the danger passed. Star's grip on Jazz's neck was tightening, and the assassin could do nothing as something started to give, eventually going out with a pop and causing a pained grunt to escape him. Energon started running down his chest, slowly adding to the runs down his abdomen, coating her other hand in the life-fluids. Sunstreaker didn't even blink to see his former 3IC treated this way, but Sideswipe and Ironhide frowned a bit.

Prowl set his gun down on the desk and sank into his chair, massaging his helm to try and relieve the growing ache, ignoring Prime and Ironhide as they tried to decide what to do with the situation. He just didn't want to deal with this, now or ever. Star's low, hissing promises of a horribly and painfully slow death seemed to drill into his head, making him almost flinch in discomfort at the graphic descriptions. He looked over in time to see another wave of energon flow out of the saboteur beneath her ever-tightening grip, and the wince on the mech's face, the way he weakly reached up to fumble at her painful grasp with his suddenly limited mobility… despite what had just happened, what he knew Jazz had been going to do to him, he found that he still cared.

Finally, as more energon seeped between the livid femme's fingers and started dripping on the floor, the tactician brought his palms down on the table loudly, drawing the room's immediate attention. "Star, don't-!" he stopped himself as she snapped her burning gaze over to him, and then continued a little more calmly. "Just… don't. Please."

The rest of the room shifted uneasily as the femme regarded him with narrowed optics and he stared back tiredly. Then, she relaxed her grip with a jerky nod and Jazz tried not to sputter and gasp at the damage left behind, even more energon spilling out of him at the released pressure. She pulled the 'Con away and drug him from the room.

"I'm taking him to medical." She muttered on the way out. Prime gestured for the twins to follow and the two frontliners slunk out after her.

Across the hall from the open door, the Autobot's newly promoted head of Special Operations leaned against the wall, and as the femme trudged out, dragging his former commander by his shoulder armor like so much scrap metal, the blue and white noble simply stared, golden optics full of accusation even as his face remained completely neutral. And Jazz grinned back easily, ignoring the throbbing pain in his throat and abdomen as he worked furiously to reroute his motor relays.

"Hey, Raj!" he greeted cheerfully, despite the roughness of his voice, as if he were speaking to an old friend. As if he hadn't framed the spy for treason and then tried to murder him. As if he hadn't just tried to kill Prowl. As if he weren't a Decepticon and hadn't betrayed them all in the most heinous way possible.

Mirage stared at the former 3iC with the revulsion a 'Con deserved, the way only Star had been able to look at him back in that room. Everybody else still saw Jazz, the music-loving, easy-going Autobot. Not Jazz the Decepticon double agent.

And then the head of Special Ops turned away and didn't spare the mech another glance. Jazz just chuckled a bit.

"See ya later then!" he called back.

His face making swift and harsh impact with the floor was a rather unpleasant surprise, and when she easily lifted him until his pedes were dangling he just stared a little blankly at the glowering femme.

"Ow." He finally said.

"It would be in your best interest to keep your mouth shut." She murmured lowly into his face, the light in her optics just cold and hard enough to let him know she meant business.

"K. No need to get worked up about it." He replied calmly.

The femme snorted and released his chestplate to grab his shoulder and start dragging him again. Jazz knew the route well. It took them right past the rec room, which was strangely empty for this time of day, but there was one mech standing just inside the wide door, watching for them it seemed, and near the door on the other side of the room he could see and hear a frothing Cliffjumper being restrained by Trailbreaker and Hound.

"LET ME AT THE GLITCH!" the red mini-bot roared. "I'LL TEAR HIM APART! I'LL MAKE HIM REGRET THE DAY HE WAS SPARKED LIKE HE'S NEVER REGRETTED ANYTHING! I'LL MAKE THAT TRAITOR PAY!" The two scouts managed to drag the enraged mech away and his protests faded.

Jazz lifted an arm and tried to give the little yellow mini-bot still standing in the closer door his jauntiest wave, though it didn't quite work due to his damaged mobility. He still grinned his 'nothing can get me down' grin, and he knew it bothered the mech by the way Bumblebee frowned and pointedly looked away.

Jazz's grin didn't falter all the way to the med-bay. When they got there, though, instead of marching through the doors the femme stopped and propped the Decepticon up against the wall in a sitting position, crouching in front of him and finally reaching down to pull his knife out of her side.

"Sideswipe, Sunstreaker, you're dismissed." She said quietly.

"Aren't you gonna, y'know, take him inside?" Sideswipe asked carefully.

"In a minute. I need to have a quick little chat with him first."

"Okay…" Sideswipe said unsurely, but he followed his brother down the hall back to the rec room after another moment of hesitation.

Star sat back on her heels, fiddling with the knife as she contemplated the saboteur with a disturbingly blank expression. Jazz cocked his helm, smirking teasingly as he waited.

"You think you're getting out of this, don't you?" she asked suddenly.

He shrugged, pretending it took more effort than it did. He had managed to reroute about 85% of his motor functions by now, and that would probably be enough, just as soon as he got the opportune moment…

"Well you're not." The flat of the cool knife was against his throat almost before he saw the femme move. She leaned closer to make her point, gaze smoldering. "I just want you to know that the only reason you are not screaming in pain right now is because Prowl asked me to stop. But that doesn't mean I'm letting you go." Her voice lowered a bit, as if she were afraid someone would hear her. "You and I both know you're far too dangerous, Jazz."

It was his turn to move so fast he was hard to see, but the femme was faster still. He had the strangest, most surreal and detached sense of déjà vu as they had an instant replay of what had happened in Prowl's office, only sans the threats and with a lot more electricity snapping through his systems. Motor functions back to 33%, the Decepticon scowled at her, but all the heat of his unseen glare was absorbed into the ice of her optics. She yanked painfully at his internals as she shifted her hand, but she didn't pull it out this time. Instead, she jerked her servo a bit and a new ball of mass appeared in his chest, small, but still big enough that the saboteur knew what it was.

"You wouldn't." he said, trying to stall so he could think of a way out of this.

Star's frosty expression thawed a bit, and the mech saw an opportunity, a crack in her coldly hateful mask. And then she depressed the trigger on the grenade and slipped her hand out of his internals, letting him slide to the floor already scrambling with slow, shaky movements to get it out of him.

"Goodbye, Jazz. I just want you to remember that you could have had it all, and you gave it up for Megatron."

"Star, I—" the Decepticon started desperately.

"Too late." She whispered.

There was quiet _whoomp_ noise from Jazz's chest and his face went slack in shock before his visor flickered, powered down, and his chassis began to grey.

Behind Star the door to med-bay swooshed open. "Of course I'm sure, would I be saying they weren't here if…"

Ratchet trailed off as the femme bent over the body to pry the red Autobot insignia off the Decepticon, and then she turned and began to walk away.

"Oh." Ratchet said, sounding a little dazed.

/What is it, Ratchet?/ Optimus wondered patiently from the other side of the comm, though with a twinge of worry in his voice.

The medic reached out to lean against the doorframe as he tried to compute something he had always thought would be a terrible thing to see when he still hadn't finished processing that Jazz was the bad guy.

/Ratchet?/

"Jazz is dead, Prime."

A lanky blue mech shimmered out of thin air to fall into step beside Star as she strode away, double-sided insignia clenched in her grip and white optics making the air sizzle around her.

"What do we do now?" Mirage murmured sedately, careful to stay out of her way.

"We move on." The femme ground out. "The Jazz we knew never existed. You clean up here. I have to visit the Nemesis."

The Ligier slowed to a stop as the femme went around the corner without once glancing back. Mirage did, though, and then he turned around and went back.

Ratchet had moved the body to a berth and was poking at it a little hesitantly. Wheeljack and First Aid were standing off to the side, Wheeljack looking sick and First Aid shuffling nervously, torn between helping and hiding away in the storage room. Mirage watched silently from the corner, where he wasn't noticed despite being completely visible, until Ratchet had popped open Jazz's chest plate, trying to diagnose how exactly Star had killed him.

There was a perfectly carved hole in the mech's chest where his spark chamber should have been. It was intriguing to the point that Ratchet started to forget who he was working on and leaned over to poke and inspect a little more intently.

"This isn't right," the medic muttered to himself. "This looks like it was surgically removed, not ripped out or blown away…"

Mirage moved closer. "What does that mean?"

Ratchet jumped, slapping a hand on the berth and turning to him quickly. "Slaggit, Mirage, no sneaking in my med-bay!"

Mirage ignored the outburst and gestured to the body. "What does that mean, that his spark chamber is gone?"

The medic turned back to continue his inspection. "I'm not sure. I'll have to do some more diagnostics and a thorough autopsy. In the meantime, get out. That goes for you two as well."

Wheeljack nearly ran out of the room, First Aid slipped into the storage room to go back to his inventory check, and Mirage slowly wandered toward the door, thinking.

If the femme had wanted to kill Jazz so bad, then why had she bothered to remove his spark chamber so carefully? Why take it in the first place? And where exactly was it now?

* * *

A/N: one more chapter on the way. soonish.


	4. Epilogues

A/N: These two epilogues are probably my favorite parts of the whole story. : D

oh, one actual curse near the end. Nothing very bad. But a curse nonetheless.

* * *

**Second Chance**

"I have a project for you."

If Alpha Trion was not as old and experienced and mellow as he was, he might have jumped a mile and thrown the stack of books he was carrying across the room. As it was he merely paused, and then finished sliding the book in his hand into place on the shelf before turning away to set the rest of the stack down on a nearby table.

"And what would be the nature of this project?" he asked calmly.

When he turned around to face the femme, she was holding up a metal sphere with faintly glowing insets. He met her firm optics, knowing what it was and what she would ask before she even opened her mouth. She tossed the orb to him and he deftly caught it to inspect the glyphs running across the metal, handling it carefully.

"Give him another chance. I think he can do better this time."

Slowly, the Archivist turned toward his lab. "I'll see what I can do."

* * *

**The Way Things Are**

The rec room was subdued as the twins entered, nodding shortly to the few mechs who acknowledged them at all. They retrieved their energon and slid into a booth against the wall, gazing with almost palpable wariness across the less than half full room. It was seven in the afternoon, local time. The day shift was just ending. It was that point in time when the rec room was usually bursting with mecha coming off and going on shift, but it wasn't, and what few mechs were in the room were either alone and keeping to themselves or in small groups of two or three and talking in hushed voices.

It had been two months.

In those two months, the Ark's inhabitants had slowly pulled away from each other. It was gradual, but noticeable. The worst part was that, while everybody knew it was happening, not a single one of them had any idea what to do. Not even the command staff. Red Alert's compulsive security had increased a hundredfold, and it seemed not even Inferno could calm him down very well anymore. Prowl hadn't been out of his office since… well, since the last time Prime had called him out for a skirmish with the 'Cons. Two weeks ago. Optimus remained quietly troubled, his spark aching at what he saw happening around him, to his Autobots, and yet found himself unable to halt the suspicion from taking root any more than anybody else. How could he allay the fears in those under his command when he struggled to resolve them in his own spark?

Ironhide tended to stay in the armory and the supply rooms, checking their stocks for no reason other than to keep his mind off of everything. Ratchet and Wheeljack and Perceptor were spending a lot of time in their respective domains, Ratchet brooding more darkly than usual, Perceptor throwing himself into his work with single-minded intensity, and Wheeljack just trying to find something to do with his hands, light fins flashing dimly as his usually hyperactive muse refused to speak.

And speaking of hyperactive talking, Bluestreak hadn't been doing much of it lately. Nobody really had. They almost all tended to avoid each other as much as possible, now.

The twins themselves had yet to pull a prank. Such activity was dangerous, these days, the stakes substantially higher. After all, they never used to have to truly worry about Red's accusations against them being taken seriously. They never used to shiver under the critical, icy gaze of their executive officer, somehow sensing how much sharper and harsher and maybe even crueler the tactician had become. They never used to have to remind themselves that they couldn't depend on their favorite saboteur to lend a hand, or bail them out, or at the very least come say hi while they were in the brig or on punishment detail.

They never used to have to remember that the jaunty mech wasn't going to bounce through the door of the rec room any second now to grin and ask everybody what was up and why the long faces and had they heard the latest joke that Spike had told Bumblebee had told him?

That wasn't how it used to be. But that was how it was now.

These observations went unspoken between the twins as they sat in silence and slowly sipped their energon in preparation of a long night of patrol, but the disappointment and helplessness and mistrust resonated between them. They didn't like it, nobody did, how they were falling apart at the joints over this, but at the same time… nobody knew, anymore. Nobody knew who to trust, or who to believe. Because honestly, if you couldn't trust Jazz…

Both frontliners looked up as a heavy-set red frame stopped next to their table with his own cube of energon in hand. He stared out at the rest of the room for a moment in grim-faced contemplation and the twins waited for him to say something.

"So." Was what Ironhide finally expressed. "We found our spy."

He took a casual sip of energon before looking down at the two mechs, something disturbingly smoldering and yet defeated in his gaze. "Didn't solve a damn thing, did it?"

The mech moved off before either of them could respond, but in reality no answer was needed, because it was plain as day, right in front of them, and there was no use in spelling it out.

This was just how it was now.

* * *

A/N: And on that both depressing and hopeful note, I bid you adieu.

There might be more to this, if I ever get around to writing it. It'll be under another story, though. Until then, reviews are, naturally, appreciated!

Many thanks!


End file.
